Catholic teaching is unequivocal on the subject of abortion, as it should be. One can not agree a little bit, or mostly with the Church’s teaching, only absolutely and entirely. Palin’s statements of belief on abortion square with the Catholic Church’s teachings although I’m not convinced that all of her views do. In the case of McCain however, he would be classifed as in ‘partial’ agreement since he supports embryonic stem cell research and abortion in cases of rape, incest, and the mother’s health. Those views are amply documented. So he falls outside the limits of tolerance on abortion from the Church’s standpoint. Moreover, from a historical perspective, while George Bush’s efforts on behalf of the unborn can be applauded to a point, he also said in the fall of 2003 that the country was ‘not ready’ for a total abortion ban. This was in response to an interview after the Federal Abortion Ban was signed into law. ‘Not Ready?’ Apparently, since 6 Republican Justices were among the 7 voting for Roe V Wade in 1973, and several Republican Presidents since then have paid lip service to their supposed opposition to abortion but have done nothing to stop it, Bush felt that it would be unpopular to introduce a ban to defend millions of unborn babies.
Again, Palin may endear herself to devout Catholics, but the challenge to those same Catholics is to consider with an informed conscience which ‘presidential’ candidate (McCain-Obama) meets the standards the Church requires. Unfortunately, neither candidate measures up.